Speakers at the Democratic National Convention emphasized the importance of a strong public education system, valuing teachers, and ensuring that college is affordable.

The GOP platform presented last week put a lot of emphasis
on school choice. This week it was the
Democrats’ turn. The Democratic platform, released on Monday night at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C., focused on
increasing access to higher education, raising standards, and rewarding good
teachers. Read it here:

EdWeek Staff Writer
Andrew Ujifusa notes in this post on the Politics
K-12 blog that the Obama administration seemed to “take a certain kind of
credit for the common core,” as the platform boasted
of the initiative in its discussion
of standards. Read more about it
here:

EdWeek Staff Writer
Alyson Klein compared and contrasted the two parties’ stances on education
issues in an NPR interview, saying that the hottest topics have been school choice and funding. When asked if there is anything that the two parties could agree on,
Alyson said that they both support charter schools and teacher evaluations in
some form. Listen to the interview here:

Education funding was
also a hot topic at the convention, with San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, and Newark Mayor Cory Booker all
pushing for greater investment in education. Gov. Deval Patrick spoke
about the changes that Massachusetts was able to make in response to Obama’s education initiatives, and North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue also touted the effectiveness of Obama’s education strategies.
Read more about what their comments here:

President Obama also underscored education issues in his acceptance speech. The president warned that GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, if elected,
would cut education spending in favor of low taxes for the wealthy. He also
presented some of his policy ideas for K-12 and higher education, summarized here:

Despite
some differences with the president’s views on merit pay and teacher evaluation, the National
Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers both endorse him for a second term. Read more about the unions’ views of Obama here:

Earlier in the evening, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne
Duncan spoke of Obama’s respect for
teachers, saying that the president
“believes teachers must be respected and paid like the professionals they are.”
Alyson Klein noted that Duncan shied away from certain controversial topics,
but Duncan said he simply did not have enough time to hit on every issue. Read about
Duncan’s speech here:

Even the controversial education activist
Michelle Rhee praised Obama’s education policies. In the past, Rhee had been
skeptical about whether Obama would pursue policies such as
charter school expansion and performance-based teacher policies, but in an
interview with EdWeek reporter Sean
Cavanagh, she admitted she was wrong about
that. Read more about this interview here: